Chapter Six

Tritus

In an ideal world, I’d have stayed with Casimir right there on the paved stones and he’d have taken me while the music thrummed inside the ball. No one would’ve cared. No one would’ve batted an eye, but tension clung to his scent and strung his muscles tight like a bow string ready to snap. It wasn’t just me he didn’t trust. He didn’t trust anyone. Not me, not his cousin, not his old playmate and her mate.

“Not even himself apparently,” my dragon chimed in as Casimir and I made our way to the landing field where we shifted and took to the night sky together. He was a gorgeous dragon with long velvety wings and big inquisitive eyes. He had all his talons too. That meant he probably hadn’t fought much since coming to Starscale 1. He didn’t smell violent, but violence doesn’t always linger on the scales.

“He’s not,” my dragon said, as the wind brushed against our scales. “He’s not violent. He’s protective and probably a bit territorial. Maybe he’ll claim us fast when we get home. Maybe he thought he couldn’t do that in the Star Room. Maybe he thought it was like those old stuffy Earthside temples or churches or something.”

I had a feeling that the location of our meeting had little to do with the fact Casimir hadn’t ravished me right then and there. That wasn’t a thought most dragons would work too hard to keep off the flight link. Whatever it was he kept it locked up like a prized possession.

The flight back to my house was shorter than I would’ve liked. In the sky, Casimir relaxed more than he ever did on the ground. We flew close to each other and the tips of our wings brushed together whenever the breeze shifted so that we could glide. This flight was familiar to something deep inside me. It wasn’t the first time our souls had flown together and it wouldn’t be the last.

I landed first because I knew the exact spot where my little potted plants around the back patio wouldn’t be flatted to pebbles under our draconic weight. Casimir was patient as I shifted back to my human form and then waved him down. He landed perfectly – majestically even, his muscles gliding like a big cat as he came down. He stretched his wings wide before curling them in and giving into his scaleless form. Somehow his tie and shoes survived the shift. Ties weren’t that common here. They were a dress up, costume accessory, but he looked good in it.

“Okay. He can keep it on but everything else has to go,” my dragon snickered into my thoughts.

That wasn’t a bad idea and I was game if Casimir was. He stood silent for a long moment looking up at the night sky. It was a gorgeous clear night, and the air was crisp with the smell of autumn. I inched toward him, unsure of how much space he wanted. He took my hand and tugged me in close to his side before wrapping his arm around me. I curled into him, fitting perfectly against his body. We had been made for each other after all.

I glanced up at the wide-open sky and when I looked back at Casimir he was looking down at me. I licked my lips without meaning too. His were parted as if he were considering kissing me too. I leaned a little closer to him, encouraging him with my own parted lips. He cupped my chin, a scale on the pad of his index finger stood out, as his lips claimed mine. The kiss was softer than I expected. So soft that it was almost a question. Still cupping my chin, he moved so that he stood in front of me. A second later, his warm, nimble tongue slipped into my mouth.

Yes! Yes! Kiss me!

My head swirled with his scent and his warmth radiating against my flesh. He let go of my chin to hold onto my hips and I slipped my arms around his neck. Rising up on my tiptoes, I deepened the kiss, meeting his tongue and tasting him again. Our bodies pressed hard together, making new terrain familiar. I leaned against him, letting him take on my weight as I surrendered to the moment. His hands wandered to my ass cheeks and kneaded the pads of his fingers into my flesh. The half-robe I wore to contrast my mask was thin and didn’t hide much from the eye and even less from his squeezing hands.

He murmured something into the kiss that I didn’t catch. He smelled relaxed as I’d ever smelled him. He took a step back and I followed him. Then he took another. Did he want to stop? Was he pulling away from me?

“Mate?” I murmured.

He stopped kissing me and I rose up on my tiptoes to press my forehead against his. Casimir’s thoughts weren’t as closed off from the flight link as before but they swirled around in abstract spirals as if they themselves tried to hide from me and everyone else who might overhear them.

“You okay?” I asked and he nodded.

“Almost lost myself there,” he grinned.

“You don’t need perfect self-control every second of every day. I promise, if you get to be too much of a cave-dragon I can hold my own.”

His grin broadened and I let out a long, slow breath.

“I’m not made of glass.”

“Kids? Protection?” he muttered the words.

“Yes and if you want. I mean, if we ---” my head spun and I leaned in against his shoulder to catch my breath. “You make it so fucking hard to think.”

“Now you know how I feel,” he chuckled. “Protection?”

“Do you want kids? I mean, of course, you do. You have an egg in the nest. So maybe---”

“I asked you first,” Casimir said.

“I do,” I nodded. “I’m not saying that I won’t be involved in your first--- Wait! Is that your first egg?”

“Yes,” he nodded.

Good. We were getting somewhere now. He’d willingly told me something about his life.

“Do you have any kids?” Casimir asked a second later.

“No, not yet. I do want them, though. As do I acknowledge that timing can be everything. So, if you need to wait ---”

“Uh---”

Had I broken him? He closed his eyes for a second and I was sure I’d asked something that went too far. Only I couldn’t figure out what it was.

“I don’t need to wait,” he said before I could say anything else. “You might want to if you ever--- Well, you just might want to.”

I worked hard to keep my face neutral. Being a guide meant sometimes I heard a lot of confusing stuff. Sometimes I heard sad stuff or angry stuff and sometimes the things people said were down right stupid. Part of my job was not to let them know that’s what I thought and that started with not flashing them a look that let it all out. Casimir wasn’t stupid but he was confusing the shit out of me.

“Shall we go inside?” I asked, nodding to the back door.

“Are you cold?” He asked, shrugging off his jacket and wrapping it around my shoulders.

I wasn’t cold but I took his jacket anyway because it smelled like him. For a second, I thought he would kiss me again, but the moment passed, and I led him inside. The neighbors weren’t nosy, but this was starting to feel like a conversation I didn’t want to have standing in the backyard.

“Bedroom. Sofa. Kitchen table. Living room carpet. Don’t care where. Just get naked,” my dragon demanded.

I ignored his wishes and led Casimir into the kitchen. I hung his jacket on the back of one of the chairs and started a kettle for tea. The Moonys drank a lot of coffee but the last thing this evening needed was more anxious energy.

“Are you cursed?” I asked, starting with the most out there question I could think of.

“Not that I know of,” Casimir said.

“You can sit down and you should. There was to be a buffet at the party. Are you hungry?”

“Are you?” he turned the question around on me.

“A bit,” I nodded. “We should eat now in case tonight leads to more interesting places.”

“Agreed,” he nodded.

“Please, sit. Be comfortable. This isn’t a prison. You aren’t a hostage, and I don’t need a bodyguard.”

Casimir sat down but kept his gaze on me as I moved around the kitchen. Working as much as I did at the Star Room meant I made a lot of meal prep up ahead of time. I tried raking my mental fingers through his thoughts again to figure out what he liked but he was sealed up tight once more. So it was chicken breast, mashed potatoes, and those little purple carrots and peas they started shipping over from 3 last year. If he didn’t like it, he’d have to tell me something else about himself.

“I’m annoying you,” Casimir said as I seasoned the food with my back to him.

“I wouldn’t say it like that.”

“You’re annoyed with me.”

“Earlier, I was talking with a friend and a co-worker named Roary. They said that the word hangry should have a cousin.”

“And?” he asked.

“Do you know what the meaning of this cousin word would be?” I asked him.

“No.”

“Basically, it would mean sexually frustrated. In a bad mood because your sexual appetite isn’t satisfied. So, I’m not annoyed with you. Perhaps a bit with myself. It’s not like I can’t make it through the equivalent of a first date without having my brains screwed out but it sorta feels like that with you. To top it off, it feels a bit one sided.”

“No,” he said, his scent flashing angry for a microsecond. “Were you not outside with me?”

“I was and---”

“Look,” Casimir said when I lost my train of thought. “I’m happy we met.”

I sniffed the air. He was telling the truth but sniffing just sucked more of his scent inside my head.

“But---”

“There’s always a but, huh?” I grunted.

“There are parts of my life that are just mine. They have to be that way. It’s not some starcrossed lover or some bullshit like that. Some things I just can’t talk about.”

“That’s why I asked if you were cursed.”

“I am then. In some ways I am if that’s how you want to look at it and before you say the claiming vows will show you what I’m talking about, no they won’t.”

I slid the chicken and veggies into the oven and stopped chopping the potatoes in half with a cleaver. Whacking them sizzled the right parts of my brain.

“There’s nothing you can tell me so bad that I wouldn’t want you here,” I said once the potatoes were done and dropped into the boiling water. “Nothing and I mean nothing.”

“Do you want me to make you less horagey?”

“Whore what?” I laughed.

I couldn’t help it. The sound broke free from deep inside me.

“Horagey,” he said it again.

“Are you combining horny and rage together?”

“Yeah. I’m making that cousin word for you.”

“It sounds like you’re calling me a raging whore,” I said, still laughing. “I’m not charging for it.”

“Okay. Be that way. Is it slut rage then?”

“Fuck you!”

“I was sorta offering to do something like that, but you got all caught up in semantics, mate,” he smirked.

“I’ll show you semantics,” I stood akimbo, half hard, half offended and very horagey.

“Is that what you call it?” he asked, scooting his chair back from the table. “Do all Starscales name their dicks?”

“Fucker.”

“I would be,” he shrugged.

“I’m trying to cook.”

“The stove and the oven are cooking. You’re standing there getting slicker and harder by the minute. I can smell how you’re gushing.”

“We still haven’t decided about waiting or not,” I said, narrowing my eyes on him.